


Three

by mage_girl



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, Feelings, Implied Relationships, Memories, Photographs, Wistful, soccercop - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-02
Updated: 2013-10-02
Packaged: 2017-12-28 05:07:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/988038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mage_girl/pseuds/mage_girl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alison makes sure to lock the door.</p><p>She has a ritual, see...</p><p>Three photographs of her hidden heart, evidence of what she's lost.</p><p>It won't hurt anyone....anyone but her...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aphrodite_mine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aphrodite_mine/gifts).



> This is a birthday fic for my amazing beta, co-writer, partner-in-crime, bestie and everything else... 
> 
> Happy Birthday, Aphrodite_mine! You are the very very best. Thank you for everything you've done and continue to do for me.
> 
> As always, thank you for the wonderful beta...ironic that you beta'd your own gift but I am the Ruler of Irony. Hah.

She had three photographs.

Not out where people could see them, of course not, she wasn’t _stupid_. But she had them where _she_ could see them. Tucked in her wallet, hidden behind a tattered grocery list.

From time to time, in the privacy of her room (and making sure the door was locked) she would take them out and look at them.

The first picture was of her and Beth. Beth with her gunmetal stare and her brows that seemed to arch dubiously over her dark eyes. Beth had set up her camera with a timer and then she’d wrapped her arms around Alison’s waist, a friendly enough gesture save for the look in her eyes. That said ‘mine’ and ‘back off’ and ‘if you were wise.’

Alison looked so soft in that photo; perhaps it was the arms around her waist, perhaps it was the way Beth’s chin tucked into the space between her shoulder and her neck. Alison remembered feeling puffs of breath on her neck and the soft skin of where her shoulder met the curve of her neck. 

She smiled, she remembered that; smiled widely like she’d never smiled before. She’d been giddy to have a whole day with Beth. Beth was often so busy and they would meet up in snatches here and there. But this day, she had Beth all to herself and maybe it showed in her smile; maybe the message was the same. ‘Mine.’

*****

The second picture was of Beth by herself. Beth wasn’t one for photographs. She claimed it made her too nervous, to have her picture taken for just anyone to see. Pictures were evidence in Beth’s mind and she wasn’t fond of evidence when she was the subject. Alison never minded getting her picture taken. She wanted to control the environment as much as she could, though. She’d pick out the place and that her hair and make up were in place. She had to look just right, everything had to _be_ just right.

Beth...Beth must have set this up herself. A “selfie” as people called them these days although Alison hated how _cheap_ that sounded. Like it was easily disposable. Like it meant nothing.

Beth was sitting on her couch, the same couch where Beth had held Alison and stroked her hair and told her everything was going to be all right (had _lied_ to Alison). The couch that smelled like comfort and Beth and security to Alison.

Beth was sitting on her couch and the sun was shining on her face, not a full on light but one dappled with shadows and the whispers of leaves. Beth had positioned herself so that the trees outside filtered the light shining into the window. 

Beth was wearing a sweater Alison had complimented her on. It was made out of angora and mohair and a touch of cashmere. Beth had mocked it, said it was made out of ‘angel hair and unicorn tails’ but smiled when Alison had touched her sleeve and a sigh of delight escaped from between her lips.

Alison had loved the way the colour warmed up Beth’s skin, how it brought a blush to her cheeks and seemed to make her eyes even darker. Alison thought the dark cranberry colour was just perfect for Beth’s pale pale skin. 

Beth wasn’t looking directly into the camera. She’d turned her head on purpose, Alison could tell. Beth had her head to the side so Alison could see the clear lines of her profile, could see the curve of one brow and the delicate flare of her nostril. She could see that Beth’s lower lip was fuller than her upper one and there was a slight overbite. Alison found that sexy and charming and it was completely different from how she saw herself.

Beth’s hair was swept over her shoulder. Its dark brown colour shone in the sun, teasing out the highlights of cinnamon and chestnut. It was thick and glossy and curled over and down Beth’s shoulders.

Alison loved the simplicity of this photo and loved even more that Beth had taken it at her home, wearing the sweater that Alison admired. 

Every time Alison took out the photo, she traced Beth’s profile from her forehead down to her neck and thought she was touching the visage of a queen.

*****

The third photograph was of herself. Alison didn’t know when this had been taken. She wasn’t aware of Beth or the camera at the time and was shocked when she’d received the photograph in the mail, that one and the other two. Alison knew Beth mailed it to her because when she opened the small package a note fell out. Beth wrote she thought Alison might like to have these photographs, that she _should_ have them.

In the photograph, she was wearing one of Beth’s sweatshirts. She remembered one time she’d been caught in the rain on her way to Beth’s house and Beth had insisted on drying her shirt in the dryer and loaning her a sweatshirt to wear until her clothing was completely dry.

She was sitting on the same couch with the sun warming her. She looked like a content cat, her legs curled up under her and her body leaning against the arm of the couch. She had a cup of tea in her hands and was blowing at the steam that could be seen, just barely, in the photo. 

Alison’s hair was still wet and shone dark underneath the sun’s rays. She had scooped it off her neck and tied it into a high ponytail; the tips barely brushed the back of her neck. Her bangs were a lost cause, of course. They were thick and plastered flat against her forehead, a droplet of water just above her left brow. She looked like a water pixie come to visit; perhaps a mermaid marooned.

Alison’s eyes filled with tears when she came to this photograph and her hands trembled every time she held it between her fingers. This was the last time she’d seen Beth, if she remembered correctly. This was the last time she was able to spend time with Beth, to feel Beth’s arms around her, to feel Beth’s kisses on her mouth and skin.

Alison fought down the urge to rip the photograph to shreds. Her grief and rage would make the flimsy paper flutter like a bird caught between prey and safety. She had to take deep breaths and remind herself that Beth took that photo to remind herself of her. Of Alison. Of their time together. 

Alison would take another deep breath and her hands would still, the photograph captured within would lie weightlessly on her fingertips. 

*****

Alison took the three photographs and methodically, ritualistically, tapped them together. First the photo of the two of them, then the photo of Beth, and finally the photo of herself were neatly aligned. Then, she’d slip it behind the grocery list that Beth wrote out and left in Alison’s purse by accident, her handwriting now painfully familiar and fading.

Alison would give the photographs one final caress before shutting her wallet, before putting it away, before unlocking the door and putting a smile on her face.

She would go about her day, then. She would pick up the children from school, come home and start dinner, continue the evening rituals as she submerged her memories and her feelings deeper and deeper.

At bedtime, when everyone was asleep, then and only then, would she allow herself to whisper, ‘ _Beth_ ,’ her heart aching, before she fell asleep.


End file.
